Rewards and Monetization

Abstract

As it stands, your little game could be considered to be complete. In the early days of computer games, you would shop it around and find a publisher who would then take care of the box, marketing, and retailers to sell your game. You, as the developer, might see around 5 percent of the retail price; for a $20 game (typical for an indie developer), that meant 50 cents, or at most, a dollar. As the Internet became ubiquitous, it became possible for indie developers to sell their own games online for half the retail price and cut out the publishers. That also meant cutting out the marketing, so the number of units sold dropped accordingly. Filling a need, Valve came up with Steam, an online publisher, or store, for both their own games and approved games (meaning, they monitor the quality) from indie developers as well.